1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a running-linked sound producing device for producing a running-linked sound according to the running state of a vehicle. The vehicle may be an actual vehicle or may be a virtual vehicle.
2. Description of the Related Art
Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2000-1142 discloses an engine sound synthesizer that reads out from a storage unit engine sound data corresponding to an operation state specified based on an engine speed and an accelerator operation amount and reproduces the engine sound data. In the engine sound synthesizer, a reproduction rate of the engine sound data is determined according to the engine speed.
Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2006-69487 discloses an engine sound synthesizer that generates synthetic sound data according to an engine speed and a throttle opening degree, and provides fluctuations according to a combustion pressure data to the synthetic sound data.
Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2010-26033 discloses a sound device that produces music, a scale sound, or an alarm sound so that the tempo, volume, or pitch changes according to a moving speed of a moving body.
The engine sound synthesizers of Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2000-1142 and Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2006-69487 produce engine sounds that are heard at all times during driving of vehicles powered by engines, and can thus provide natural comfortable sounds. However, the configuration becomes complicated for reading out different engine sound data depending on the operation state and the like or for providing fluctuations to engine sound data, so that there is a large computational load on a computer component of the system.
With the sound device of Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2010-26033, the sound to be produced is likely to be a monotonous sound lacking depth (or thickness), and may not always be a comfortable sound to people around the moving body and a passenger on the moving body. In particular, the passenger on the moving body constantly hears that sound while moving, and it is thus desirable to provide a comfortable sound that fluctuates according to the state of the moving body and has sufficient depth (for example, with a sense of depth).